Yukio Mishima

I've just finished writing a short bio of Japanese writer Yukio Mishima for another site. Now that I have got to know him, as one does when writing about a particular topic, I have to say I have mixed feelings about him—I admire his brilliance, his yearning for beauty and perfection, his desire that life have meaning, integrity and discipline, and be about action rather than words; yet the way he ended his life—violently, publically and elaborately staged—I cannot but see as a tragic waste—and anything but the beauty which he strove to embody.

I will at some point write something more about his beauty aesthetic, flawed and tragic though it was, but for now here is a short bio:

The Life and Death of Yukio Mishima

Interesting video interview in English with Mishima shortly before his death: